Fortitude Consequences
by gaffer42
Summary: Sequel to Fortitude, but stands alone. When is solitude easier to bear than friendship? In four parts. Reference to Behavioural Theory story, tiny spoiler for Sanctuary.
1. Default Chapter

Rated: T

Category: Angst, drama

Spoilers: Can't think of any

Author Notes: Sequel to Fortitude, which is somewhere here on this site. Written when there were several emails telling me I couldn't leave it at that. I think there's enough in this story to let you know what happened in that one, you don't need to read the other – but if you want to, I've no objection ;)

Woo hoo – learning how to do chapters, too, in response to other emails received. Sorry – I don't post a story till it's complete, so chapter breaks aren't something I think of off hand. Hope this makes it easier to read.

Again, with the grammar, it's been beta'd by two wonderful folk so anything left is intentional or Canadian.

Disclaimer: Not mine, wish they were. Don't sue me, you won't get anything out of it. But thanks to the producers for coming up with such amazing characters, and to the writers and actors for making them so compelling.

**Fortitude Consequences**

_Excerpt from the letters of Dr. K. Heightmeyer_

_Dear Tony;_

_I always heard Joni was a genius. You made me realize it, and it's just so true. You don't know what you've got till it's gone._

_When I was told Rodney McKay's body had been recovered from a cave-in on Deemas, I was surprised how distraught it made me feel. He's been coming to me, off and on, for several months now - a man who found himself in circumstances he'd never anticipated. The pressure of being the answer man, the rainmaker, the one you go to for solutions, it was wearing on him, but he was rising to the challenge in a way I never thought he'd be able to. _

_For almost a full day the entire city mourned him. I tried to speak to his team, but the rest of the gate teams closed ranks, and I couldn't blame them, really. I knew it would hit Elizabeth and John the hardest, professionally and personally, and it would throw a wrench into the command structure, causing immeasurable ripples. I did manage to speak to several of the recovery team. _

_I can see you shaking your head, Tony, but the way I practise here isn't like anywhere else. Firstly, I know these people, I live with them, eat with them, and I can't maintain the detachment I used to on Earth. Secondly, we're a city under siege, and as much as I don't want to admit it, psychology is a science of leisure. It takes time to get at underlying causes, and it's hard to get that commitment when the chief concerns are obtaining enough food, finding sources of energy, and preparing for imminent attack by a life-sucking alien species. I guess what I'm getting at, is that I don't just work in my office, a lot of what I end up doing is on the fly. It's not the way to do it right, but other requirements take precedence._

_Anyway, I told you we mourned him for a day - because after that, the DNA tests proved the body wasn't McKay's. The Genii - I mentioned them before - had pulled a switch, and it meant that McKay was in the hands of some very nasty people. _

_Long story short, McKay was alive, but by the time he was recovered he'd been through some pretty vicious torture. I took that extra training because it was offered, never thinking I'd use it - but I've had three torture victims now, since joining SGC, and Rodney's my fourth._

_Interesting choice of words, I suppose. My fourth. You always said I got too possessive of my patients._

_But my point is, it's not just the - well, victim isn't the greatest word, maybe subject would be better…heck, we're in Pegasus, political correctness hasn't found us yet - it isn't the victim only that needs help. On Earth we had a team, here I'm the only one with experience in treatment, and I'm not letting anyone else practise on the head of science and the head of the military._

_Yes, the head of the military. John Sheppard is losing it. Highly technical reference, I know. Thing is, he's had as many ghosts in his past as Rodney, just different shades. He lost two very good friends in Afghanistan, and his behaviour since seemed to have been dedicated to getting by. He'd avoided any close friendships since then, and if General O'Neil hadn't dragged him into the underground ofAntarcticawhen he did, I think he'd have spent the rest of his career in the butt-end of nowhere._

_He and McKay struck up the most unlikely of friendships I've seen, and one of the closest. Tony, my first thought when I heard McKay was dead was 'damn, that means we've lost them both.' Unscientific, I know, and probably not strictly accurate, but honest. And McKay - he's the same way about Sheppard. Remember Professor Flynn, and those photos? How you were supposed to be able to tell relationships within families and groups by how the people stood in relation to each other? And all those hours of lectures about personal space?_

_If you were to take a photo of these two, you might not notice much. They'd stand there, smiling or frowning depending on the circumstance, but between them there is no personal space. No polite distance. It's like twins, like close siblings, or old married couples. _

_At least that's the way it was. McKay was recovered from the Genii, and began to mend, and we started working through the residue from the torture. And somehow, somewhere along the line Sheppard began to pull away again. He won't talk to me, missed an appointment we set, and now it's beginning to affect McKay again._

_I think I'm gonna have to ambush him._

xxxxx

She took her tray and scanned the room. It was shift change, and the seats were fairly full, as she'd known they'd be. Her usual choice was to eat off-shift, when the place was quieter, but she'd chosen this meal for a specific reason.

And there he was, on the edge of the group of tables.

"Teyla. Major. May I join you?" she said.

She didn't miss the reaction her simple question garnered, and sighed to herself as Sheppard blinked and drew away a hair. It was a subtle movement, if she hadn't been looking for it she wouldn't have seen it, would have had just a small feeling of being unwelcome. She smiled at them both and sat.

It wasn't Teyla's way to make conversation for the sake of it, and Sheppard's attention was, apparently, on his food - though not much of it was eaten - so it was they sat in silence for a few moments.

She didn't mind. Much of her work was done in silence. People seldom came right out and spoke about what was bothering them, but a good tactic was to ask a leading question and then simply listen. The person would talk for a few moments, she would smile and wait, and the silence would tease out more and more information as her subject would try to fill the quiet.

This was no exception. "Sorry I didn't make it to the appointment." Sheppard said. "I had a couple urgent things come up."

She finished her bite of sandwich, nodded. "We should re-schedule."

Sheppard grunted non-committally.

She glanced around the room, seeing McKay at the center of a group of scientists. He was holding forth on some obscure bit of gate dynamics, with contributions from Zelenka.

"Good to see him back." she observed.

"Yeah." It was a chink in the armour of disinterest he was trying to project, but it didn't last. He glanced over, eyes warming briefly, then turned his attention back to his plate which, for all the cutting and moving of food, seemed still rather full.

She caught Teyla's eye, and the Athosian understood, standing and taking her tray. For all she didn't know Heightmeyer, or really understand her place in the hierarchy, she knew that Elizabeth spoke to her occasionally, and could see Kate's real concern for Sheppard. She nodded to the others, and left. For a second it seemed as if Sheppard would do the same, but good manners won out and he just exchanged a few words with her, referencing the return to Deemas.

"You're going back?" she asked offhandedly.

"We promised to help them come up with a warning system. And install it."

"What do you think about going back there?"

He cut his eyes up to her. "Wondered when you'd start."

"What?"

"Asking questions."

She sighed. "It's kind of my job, John." She waited. "Well?"

"We have to go back. We promised. I don't have to like it."

"You don't like it?"

He placed his hands on either side of the tray with deliberation. "No. I don't. I'm not looking forward to it, but it's got to be done."

"They seem like nice enough people."

"That's not the point. Listen - let's call it bad memories and leave it at that, huh?" He was beginning to lose his temper.

"Really?"

"Really!" He spoke loudly, too loudly, and conversation at the tables nearest them lulled slightly.

"I've told you. I've told Liz. I'm fine. I'm used to this, I've done it before." He spoke quietly, but the tension reverberated in each sentence.

"Used to what?"

His jaw clenched. "Used to having people die. I'm in the military, Doctor. That's something that comes with the territory. You grow close to people, and then they die. Usually in various horrifying ways. It's something you learn to deal with."

She took a sip of her drink. "Rodney's not military," she observed quietly. "And he's not dead."

It hit a nerve. She saw, for an instant, fury and terror in his eyes - before he stood, without retrieving his tray, and stalked out.

Again the conversation paused, but she merely slid his tray under hers, re-arranged the plates, and continued eating. Her composure betrayed nothing of her worry.

xxxxx

"Elizabeth, if we were on Earth I'd ground him."

Weir blinked. The question had been simple, an offhand 'how's John?' - she'd heard they'd lunched together, and was curious. Heightmeyer's arrival in her office had her concerned for McKay, but Sheppard?

"I think maybe you'd better start at the beginning." She gestured Kate to sit, and dropped into her own chair.

"Protocol..."the psychologist started "would dictate that every single member of that recovery team should have had at least one session with me." She raised her hands, forestalling the reply Weir was shaping. "I know, because of the limits to our manpower it wasn't enforceable. Most of them have been by anyway, just for a chat, even Aiden. But as the Lieutenant left, he asked if the Major had been in. I asked why. He said that he didn't think John was sleeping that well, he seemed very ill tempered, and the team had only gotten together socially once since Rodney's release from the infirmary."

"That's unusual. It's been a week and a half."

"Exactly. Ford said they would normally have met up at least five or six times by now. He said it was like Sheppard was avoiding them."

"And that's what the lunch with the Major was about."

"Precisely. I'd managed to get him to agree to see me, we even had an appointment, but he blew me off. Lunch was a way to get a sense of where he is." She leaned forward. "Elizabeth, I know this trip back to Deemas is important, but I don't feel it's in John's best interests right now."

Weir recognized it as a request, but she shook her head. "I'm sorry, Kate, but it's key to our trading relationships with these people. There's supposed to be some sort of ceremony of gratitude."

Kate sighed. "I understand. But in return, I'd ask a favour."

"Order him to speak to you."

She cocked her head. "Forcefully request."

Weir nodded. "Consider it done. Now, how about Rodney?"

"He's reached a bit of a plateau, I think he'll be ready for the return trip, though. After that, I should be able to clear him for the team again." She smiled a bit. "He's remarkably resilient."

"Remarkably." Her tone was resigned.

"Something else?" Heightmeyer raised an eyebrow.

"I've just…been thinking. I never really wanted Rodney to be on a team, having the head of science and the military on the same one struck me as putting too many eggs in one basket. I never thought he'd be so good at it." She grinned sadly. "I figured I'd indulge them, maybe give it a month before they drove each other nuts and one or the other was at my door demanding he be grounded."

"You didn't anticipate their friendship, either."

"No."

"One thing I've learned in my job, Elizabeth, is that people surprise you."

xxxxx

_Excerpt from the letters of Dr. K. Heightmeyer_

_I told her I thought the trip was a mistake, but as usual the needs of the many outweighed the needs of the few. The Deemas are good people, they also grow something that's as close to wheat as I think we'll ever get. Again, Tony, with the food. It's a fixation here. We still have about two weeks worth left if things get tight, but we always hoped to become more-or-less self-sufficient. _

_All I can do is hope it doesn't set either of them back too badly. Aiden has become my eyes and ears in that team, and what I hear doesn't fill me with confidence._

xxxxx

"Are we ready, people?" Sheppard bellowed over the bustle. The materials were on crude carts, and the honorary, first stone stood on a small riser. It had a bow on it. Ford felt it should look festive.

"Waiting on the doc!" the Lieutenant called back. He glanced around the group, smiled a bit. Teyla was beside him, and she was grinning, too. Somehow, some of the tension that had been developing since they'd returned the first time had dissipated. It wasn't back to normal, but for the first time he thought it might have a chance to get that way.

He saw Sheppard pacing, stop as McKay appeared, and he took a half-step towards his CO at the expression on the man's face. The animation drained away. He looked lost, for just a moment, then he was the Major again, berating McKay for being late, and McKay was snarking back, but there was no sense of normalcy to it.

The tension was back. He glanced at Sheppard, wondering what had caused his reaction, then at McKay. And at what he was wearing.

"I believed that jacket destroyed." Teyla whispered to him.

"He had two, I guess."

"It is a small thing, but I find it - somewhat distressing."

"It looks like the Major does too."

And then the gate was open, someone tossed the stone through, with far less ceremony than originally intended, and they were following.

xxxxx

"So." McKay wiped his hands with a scrap of cloth, gesturing at the windmill. "That will power the batteries. The batteries will power the sensors. The sensors will read any incoming wormhole and trigger the siren, and the siren will warn your advance guard you've got company."

He grinned. "Then, the Major's simple, but elegant solution" he glanced over, but Sheppard's face was impassive, as if he hadn't heard "to your uninvited guests - if you see a stone come through first, it's friendly. If you don't, beware." He tucked the greasy cloth into his back pocket absently, then laid down on the ground and reached behind the panel where the sensors were. Merya peered in, her small head almost touching McKay's.

"Pretty," she commented, drawn to the colours as most children would be.

"It is, isn't it?" McKay agreed. "Crystals are the most amazing shapes sometimes, and the colours…"

He made a final adjustment and sat up, moving Merya carefully out of the way.

Ford watched, grinning. The six year old had appointed herself McKay's guardian, fetching things for him, staring at him as he explained things that there was no way she understood, and just staying nearby. Taran said she felt responsible for him, ever since their first meeting days before, when both were captives. For McKay's part, he had been uncommonly patient, particularly given his oft-stated dislike for children. It was just as his grandma had said. Never trust a man that kids and dogs didn't like. Kids and dogs know.

"Done! Thank you, Merya." McKay took the small cover from her and replaced it over the access. She smiled broadly, and ran to her brother.

"Up," she requested. Taran lifted her over his head, and she squealed with delight as the whole group - less three, the first of the gate guards - headed back to the village.

xxxxx

"The resilience of youth." Sheppard muttered, as Ford and Teyla followed. Nowhere in the child's demeanour was there any indication she and her playmatesbeen kidnapped, held captive, and threatened, as part of the Genii plan to compel McKay to build a nuke.

He took McKay's jacket from where it had been folded carefully on a branch, and handed it to the physicist. It was an act of defiance, kicking sand in the face of his fear, though he was the only one who knew it as such. He'd known McKay had two uniform jackets, they all did, but it had been deja-vu when the man showed up in front of the gate, ready to go. He'd had to sit, firmly, on the sudden desire to order him off the expedition, send him back to his nice, safe lab. It was irrational, and he knew that. He didn't need any clinical psychologist to tell him rational from irrational, no matter how many times Heightmeyer asked him to come by.

The other jacket had been irreparable - not that he thought McKay would want to wear it again - and Weir had simply had Beckett place it back in the body bag. Now, reduced to its constituent atoms along with the unidentified body Kolya had arranged for them to find, it was gone.

Not forgotten. Just gone.

His thoughts were dark, and he missed the glance of worry McKay gave him. Instead, Sheppard turned and made for the path, following the others.

McKay wandered after him, and gave it a few moments before broaching the next subject.

"So. When you were digging out the decoy me, did you notice anything interesting?"

"Interesting?" disbelief coloured Sheppard's tone. "We still thought it was you, remember, we weren't looking at anything else."

"I understand, I do," McKay hastened to say. "It's just..."

"Just what?"

McKay hesitated. The tone was sharp.

"There was something there, Major. I swear," he appealed, following Sheppard along the path.

"Was it a power signature?" Sheppard asked.

"No."

"Was it possibly a cache of Ancient technology?" His voice was flat.

McKay frowned. "No."

"What was it, then?" Sheppard stopped suddenly, and McKay almost bumped into him. He took a half-step back. Sheppard's face was closed, neutral, and somewhere a small warning prodded him.

"It was - well - a rock. With carvings. The cable - well, that was part of the trap. But I remember seeing something - looked like Ancient letters on what might have been some kind of a small capstone…"

"No power means no ZPM. Which means we're not interested. End of discussion." Sheppard turned and strode off, shoulders set.

"Major?" McKay trotted to keep up. "Major, if we could just make a quick side trip - it wouldn't take long…"

Sheppard stopped and swung around again, and this time his face wasn't neutral. He was angry.

"What part of 'No' don't you comprehend, McKay? We are not going back to the ruins. We are going to have a nice lunch and a pleasant afternoon with our friends, and then we are going back home. We are not going back to a pile of rocks to look for another rock. We are most particularly not going back to THAT damned pile of rock. In fact, after today, I would be just as happy if I never had to set foot on this planet again! Clear enough?"

McKay glanced over Sheppard's shoulder, but the rest of the group was far enough away that they hadn't heard the Major's remarks. He looked at his friend, really looked closely, and saw - buried beneath the anger - fear. Pain remembered. Loss.

He shifted, sighed.

"You're right." he conceded. "Let my enthusiasm run away with me again. Sorry."

Any other time, the confusion on Sheppard's face would have been humourous, but McKay knew the man hadn't expected him to understand.

"Okay, then," Sheppard said, covering the lapse. "Now come on. I'm hungry."

xxxxx

The afternoon was drawing on. The children had romped and played with them, then Taran had gathered them together and they'd disappeared into the woods.

Ford found the forgiveness of the Deemas rather odd - he'd mentioned to Telya that he wasn't certain he'd trust his kids with the person who got them kidnapped - but she merely smiled at him and reminded him of the difference in the way people lived and thought. From the head man's point of view, Taran's reasons had been understandable, and everything had worked out. His place was teacher, and he filled it well.

There had been some bits of the sweet bars served for dessert left over, and he amused himself for a while by feeding them to the local version of squirrel. He'd managed to get one of them to almost take the scrap from his fingers when the animal scurried away at the approach of a shadow. He glanced up. It was Sheppard.

"Seen McKay?" he asked shortly.

"No sir." He thought for a moment. "Not for an hour or so."

"Damn." Sheppard swore. "Damn him. I said no, and of course he has to take off…" He let the sentence trail off. "Ford, get Teyla - and be quiet about it. If he's gone where I think he has, the fewer witnesses the better."

It raised the hair on the back of his neck, walking that path again. It had been widened by the rescue crew from Atlantis, and newly broken branches lay to the sides of it. The grass had the odd trampled look of a dirty carpet. Sheppard strode ahead, and fury was evident in every step. Teyla was a few steps back, watching the Major with concern.

He was tail end Charlie, as usual, but it kept him out of Sheppard's line of sight. Ford spared a moment to pray McKay wasn't at the ruins, because if he was, given the temper Sheppard was in, there was a good chance things would be said that wouldn't be meant.

And it seemed he'd been lucky. They got to the site, with the muddy, trampled ground showing no new traces.

"McKay!" Sheppard yelled. Ford thought to himself that if he heard the Major use that tone of voice when calling his name, he'd have to think seriously about whether or not to answer.

"Damnit! McKay! You get out here right damn now!"

Silence.

"McKay!" The shout had an edge of desperation. Ford wasn't used to hearing that particular edge. He glanced at Teyla, who stepped forward quickly.

"It would appear he is not here, Major. He would not have come here without your permission, am I correct?"

Sheppard was ranging around the site, reminding Ford of nothing so much as a hunting dog casting about for a scent. Teyla's question made him stop.

"Yes," he conceded.

"And you gave no such permission?"

Sheppard's glare was her answer.

"I do not recall Doctor McKay lying to us in the past," she said quietly.

Sheppard drew a deep breath, and Ford could almost see him pulling his command presence around him.

"You're right," he said.

Ford grinned encouragingly. "Back to the village?" he suggested. "I bet he went to find out how they made those dessert bars."

Sheppard nodded, and sighed. "He can't have gotten far."

xxxxx

They broke the tree line and heard the commotion before they saw it - all eleven children were laughing and chasing each other, covered in mud. They were being watched indulgently by the adults of the village, and by two equally muddy men - Taran and McKay.

Sheppard sauntered up.

"And you couldn't say 'by the way, I'm going to play in some mud, see you later'?" he asked, elaborately casual.

"What?" McKay shook his head, tapped his ear. "We were building a dam," he said. "Got mud in my ear. Where were you?"

Sheppard opened his mouth, but shut it a second later. This wasn't the place or the time. He cleared his throat. "McKay."

McKay looked up from the ground, where four very grubby youngsters had tackled him. "Major?"

"Time to go."

xxxxx

McKay had scraped off the worst of the mud by the time they made it to the gate, and Sheppard hadn't said a word. Teyla exchanged a glance with Ford as he dialled, and in answer he shrugged.

The wormhole established, they made their farewells, trouped through. On the other side, by unspoken agreement, Ford and Teyla went one way. Sheppard, though, grabbed McKay by a grubby elbow and steered him onto the balcony, closing the doors.

"What?" McKay glared. "I want a shower. Muddy, you know?"

"Don't do that again," Sheppard said flatly.

"What?"

"Take off like that! You should know better by now."

"What, so now I have to ask permission? What am I, twelve?"

"You sure behaved like it back there. Listen." He made a concentrated effort to control himself. "All I want is for the people on my team to just mention when they're taking off."

"Mother may I. Gee, Major, I haven't played that in years." Sarcasm was thick in the comment.

"Damnit! It's not a game! You took off there, and it was like…" he paused, drew a breath. "We went looking for you."

McKay stared at him. "And you went to the ruins, didn't you, even after I told you I wasn't going to go back. So now you don't trust my word, never mind letting me wander around on my own."

Sheppard stared at him. This was not how a leader behaved, a nasty little voice sang in his ear. This wasn't the way to deal with people he was responsible for.

McKay was waiting for an answer, arms folded, anger in his eyes.

"That's not it." He stopped, truly at a loss for words. He looked at the physicist, hoping McKay would understand, toss a sharp comment, and things would be normal again.

But he just stood there for a moment, then frowned. "Well, you be sure and let me know when you figure out what it is." He turned on his heel and strode into the city.


	2. Part 2

Part 2

_Excerpt from the letters of Dr. K. Heightmeyer_

_Oh, Tony, sometimes I hate being right. _

_Sheppard's cut McKay out entirely. I don't think they talk at all beyond their jobs. It's having an effect on the others - Aiden isn't sleeping, Teyla has been in twice to see if there's anything she can do._

_I only see him in passing, but I know what's happening. He's closing down again. Only thing is, this time there are still people on the outside who care. _

_And McKay's stopped talking. He still comes, but he doesn't really talk, he just natters. _

_I think I'm losing him, Tony. I think I'm losing them both. _

xxxxx

"He's been ducking me."

Weir turned from the window and looked at Kate Heightmeyer, raising an eyebrow. "Rodney?"

"Major Sheppard. He's been deliberately avoiding me. I heard from Carson he asked for a sleep aid."

"It's that serious." Weir sat opposite.

"He was irritable before, but now he's graduated to depressed, withdrawn, and easily angered. Dr. Zelenka has approached me about intervening."

"He's still fulfilling his duties, Kate. His decisions are still sound. I'm going to make certain he keeps that appointment."

"One session won't make it better."

Weir sighed. "I understand your concern, and if we were in a normally functioning expedition situation I would pull him off duty. But right now…" she leaned forward "I can't afford to do that. Unless, and until, he starts behaving irrationally, he stays on duty and in charge of the military."

Heightmeyer shook her head. "I don't like it, and it's my opinion this will just make it harder when he finally does come by." She sighed. "That said, and on record, I understand."

"Thank you." She caught Kate's eye, and repeated it, seeing in the other woman's face her dislike for the position she found herself in. "What about Rodney?"

Heightmeyer frowned. "That's another issue," she said. "He's stopped communicating. He still comes to the sessions, but I can't get him to open up anymore, and I think it has something to do with how his relationship with the Major has soured. If something doesn't happen between them, and soon, he'll begin to backslide."

Weir toyed with a pen. "What if nothing happens?"

Heightmeyer sighed. "You might have to go back to your first instinct. Break them up. Keep McKay on Atlantis."

Weir stared. "It would kill him."

"He's nowhere near peak condition, Elizabeth. He's in no shape to go offworld. Neither is Sheppard, but I have to bow to reality there."

Weir's expression was closed, thoughtful. "Recommendations?"

"I'm speaking as a friend here, not a psychologist. Give it one more mission. See if they can sort it out between them. If they can't, keep McKay in the city, at least till I can do more work with them both."

xxxxx

Standing in her office, staring out at the gate again, she recalled Heightmeyer's words.

"Careful what you wish for," she whispered to herself.

Chaya had happened, and the simmering anger had bubbled forth. Things had been said, in her presence and outside them, that made her despair of the friendship the two had shared.

McKay had slotted firmly back into the obnoxious scientist mode the day after returning from Deemas, spending more time alone in his lab, falling into old habits of sleeplessness and overwork. Even the untrained eye could see him beginning to backslide.

She'd stood by her decision, sent her first team out again, and now she wondered what, if anything, could pull them back together.

"He's way overdue."

McKay could move quietly when he wanted to, and Weir was hard-pressed not to jump when he appeared suddenly at her elbow.

"I know," she replied. "He knew the score."

"You're not seriously thinking of abandoning him?"

She stared at him. Maybe that friendship wasn't quite dead yet. She tightened her lips. "He knew we couldn't come after him. He knew he was on his own."

"She was an Ancient, Elizabeth. We don't know why she was shunned - we only have her word for it. He has to be under her influence. It's the only explanation for his behaviour."

She rounded on him at that, deliberately channeling her frustration into her words. She'd learned, in her experience with negotiation, that sometimes you used the carrot. Sometimes the stick.

"What would you know about his behaviour?" she snapped, and he stepped back. "You've cut off from us, Rodney. You spend all your time in your lab, and when you're on missions you spend all your time fighting with John."

He frowned, and she sighed. "Or he's fighting with you. We've gone over this, Beckett, Heightmeyer and I." She glanced around. They were being carefully ignored, and no one was within earshot. "I know about the panic attacks. The nightmares. Did you know the Major has been having similar problems?"

Judging by the surprised look, he hadn't. "He's been pulling away," he said. "Hasn't talked to me in days, except to give me orders or crap."

"We'd hoped this mission might help. We were going to discuss this with you both when you returned."

"Well, that worked out real well," he said bitterly. "So, I've stopped improving and he's got PTSD. Off we go."

"It was a chance." She dropped her elbows on the balcony, staring down. "We're hoping to salvage the two of you," she admitted frankly. "I don't want to believe Kolya has managed to beat you both."

"Both." A sharp laugh. "Didn't see him getting the crap beat out of him. Or finding out first hand that yeah, you do piss yourself when some loon wires you up to a big old battery."

"No." Elizabeth damped down the anger. "He dug at the rock with his bare hands, managed to keep it together when he found a body with no head. He didn't lose control till after he gave his report, then we didn't see him for hours. Teyla found him. He was in your quarters, sitting in a corner, and he'd finally fallen asleep."

McKay stared at her.

"Rather than waking him, embarrassing him, she went back outside and hammered on the door till he heard her. Then she took him back to his own quarters and stayed with him until he slept again."

McKay dropped his eyes to the floor, finding his shoes suddenly very interesting. "I thought we were fine - well, ok, anyway - until we went back to Deemas."

"Kate tried to get him to see her, he broke two appointments. I was going to make it an order after Chaya left." She sighed. "I should have spoken to him sooner."

"Incoming wormhole." The alarm interrupted them, and they shared a relieved glance when Grodin added "Major Sheppard's IDC."

xxxxx

They were waiting when he'd postflighted the jumper and shut down, but he didn't get up right away. Elizabeth and Rodney were out there, and he'd seen the reality of Chaya...he just didn't feel like the confrontation he knew was coming.

He'd caught a glimpse of what the Ancients had spent so much time chasing, and he was trying to understand. If it were before - funny how quickly his life had fallen into 'before' the kidnapping and 'after' - he would have been able to show up at McKay's lab door, maybe with a couple cups of coffee, wander in, sit down and describe it. He knew just how McKay would react, too, if it were before; when he listened and evaluated new information like whatever you'd just told him was the most important thing in the world at that time. The man was a sponge for information. He'd analyse it, disassemble it, flip it upside down and go through it again, and by the time he was done you'd know everything you wanted to know.

He knew, though, what McKay's reaction would be if he tried that now.

Not that he blamed the man. Sheppard knew, now, just how easy it was for her to pull the wool over everyone's eyes. He realized that he, too, Mr. Skeptic, had been influenced, and it was that discovery that Chaya had seen in him. The offer to glimpse asencion had been by way of apology, he knew now, and it was an apology he still wasn't certain he accepted.

He was still furious, a targetless, diffuse anger. He sat there, trying to decide who he was angrier at - himself, for being influenced, Chaya for influencing, or McKay for being right.

He looked up at the sound of the hatch opening, and McKay hurried forward.

"Major?" He sounded concerned, worried that Sheppard was hurt instead of just woolgathering. It made the Major feel embarrassed, which in turn made him irritated.

"I'm fine, fine." He stood, turned, frowned at McKay who stood just inside the internal doors, shifting foot to foot. "What?"

"Three hours without radio contact in a hot zone, that's what!" he exploded, frustrated. He recognized the beginning of a fine McKay rant, and tried to forestall it.

"I was on the surface with Chaya. She had no problems taking care of the Wraith, they were gone within minutes."

"And what kept you from calling, just to let us know?" McKay wasn't moving, and Elizabeth was stuck behind him. "You know, so we knew you hadn't been blown to bits."

"I was with Chaya." He couldn't help using a tone of voice that gave Rodney the whole story, if not exactly the details.

"Perfect! Just perfect! While we were waiting here, wondering, you were indulging in some interspecies nookie!" He was in full cry, and Sheppard stepped forward, jaw set.

"She showed me what it was to be ascended, McKay. She showed me a lot of things. She wasn't as powerful as we thought she was, no evil sorceress sitting in her prison waiting to break loose, just a really old, really lonely woman. Sorry about that." He bit off the last three words.

"Showed you a lot of things. I'll bet. You were gone for hours, Major. Believe it or not, there are some people on this city who actually give a damn about you. Not, of course, that you give a rats ass when you're getting your rocks off with an immortal whore…" He stopped talking abruptly as Sheppard, furious, grabbed him by one shoulder, pulling his other fist back. The fury coalesced, he had a target and a deep desire to hit something...

"Go ahead." The physicist's voice was soft. "She'd be so proud of you."

Flustered, he let his arm drop, let McKay go, dropped into the seat behind. He heard McKay muttering, heard him turn and push past Elizabeth with a brusque 'sorry', and then her voice.

"This isn't over."

She was out of the jumper before he whispered, "It never will be."

xxxxx

_Excerpt from the letters of Dr. K. Heightmeyer_

_I'm going to have to be the bad guy. Again. _

_Sheppard's got to keep going out there, that's been made clear, and the thing of it is, if he doesn't have McKay around to worry about and fight with he should be able to function. So we're going to pull McKay off the team. I keep saying 'temporarily', at least to myself, but if the pressure doesn't let up then Sheppard's going to go full on PTSD and I can just imagine what'll happen to McKay - it's so true, the old saw about genius and insanity._

_It's going to hurt McKay, though. I think - I think he can work through it, as long as we're in the situation we are. He might appreciate the break from Sheppard; they almost came to blows about that Ancient, Chaya._

_Who am I kidding. _

xxxxx

It had been a quiet morning. Elizabeth gave up staring at her computer, finally, and stood, stretching. Very early, Zelenka had been in to see what he could do to help. Sheppard had been in, to apologise for his behaviour the previous day; more out of duty, shefelt, than any actual contrition. Teyla had come to discuss the situation between McKay and Sheppard. "They have shared so much, and that connection is still there," she'd said, "but I am at a loss how to help them find it again." She'd promised to keep Weir appraised of anything she felt important. Some might call it spying, she mused, but the two leaders recognized the necessity of it. Ford had been busy on the mainland since before sunrise with training exercises, and McKay was, as always, in his lab.

And Kate had visited. It had been uncomfortable, but the end result was what she'd thought it would be. She needed to speak with Sheppard, and then together they would talk to Rodney.

It was not a conversation she looked forward to having.

xxxxx

"You're kidding."

McKay stood, hands slamming down on the conference table. "You have to be kidding me. Elizabeth - you're not letting this...this grunt rescind my offworld privileges?"

"The Major and I," she emphasized the last two words, "feel your time would be better spent here, working with the Ancient technology already discovered. For all we know there's something that could turn the balance of power between us and the Wraith. You're our best bet to find it."

McKay strode around the table. Sheppard stood as he approached, stepping right up into the Major's face.

"You're kicking me off the team," he hissed. "What, I'm damaged goods, now? Can't be trusted?"

"You're being re-assigned," Sheppard replied steadily. "It happens. Don't take it so personally."

"And you!" he swung to Weir. "I believe it of him, but you?"

"I was uneasy from the first with the thought of having two department heads on one team," she admitted.

He stepped back, shaking his head as if he'd taken a blow.

"Fine," he said finally. "Fine. I'll be a good little geek and go back to the lab where I belong." The glare he aimed at Sheppard was murderous, and he hammered the door controls, barely waiting for the panels to swing before stalking out.

Sheppard sat as if all the starch had left his legs.

"That could have gone better," he said.

Weir touched the control gently, and the panels swung shut. She sat, staring at Sheppard for a long moment.

"What?"

"We made this decision together, and it's logical for now, but I think there's another reason you want him here, in the questionable safety of the city."

She raised an eyebrow at him, waiting, but he merely nodded.

"My team. My call," he replied simply. Standing, he opened the panels again.

"John," she spoke his name sharply.

"What?"

"Heightmeyer's office. Now."

He swung around, angry, but she met his gaze flatly.

"Now, John. Or you're grounded too."

xxxxx

_Excerpt from the letters of Dr. K. Heightmeyer_

_I am so out of my depth, Tony. But I can't think of anything I could do that would have made it any better, or yielded a different result._

_There have been two short missions with the new SGA-1 team, I recommended Stu Derry as McKay's replacement. Nice Aussie guy, easy to work with, and by all accounts the missions were not failures, but Aiden came by. Sheppard's almost completely uncommunicative now. On the plus side, he's not promising C4 to agrarian cultures (I can tell you about that later, it doesn't matter what I say, nothing of this will make it back to Earth) but he's just become - Joe Army Guy. I know what he's doing. _

_McKay is working himself to a nervous breakdown, but I can't stop him. And there's a nasty little question there - if I could, would I? The Wraith threat is very real, and very close - we don't know how close yet but we know they've begun to cull. Grodin, Zelenka and the others are smart, geniuses, but they don't have the instinct McKay does, he is capable of making enormous leaps based on what would be scraps of information to anyone else. _

_I can't get any commitment to work with me from Sheppard, we've had three chats, and I see him losing himself in front of me. I can't even get McKay to open up anymore, and I can't get him to sit still with me for more than a few moments at a time. The thing is, I know what I need to do to save these two before we lose them, but in our present circumstances there's no chance I could have the time we need to do it._

_I'm failing them, Tony. And I feel so helpless._

xxxxx

Peace.

He wandered the halls, idly, ostensibly mapping what had already been scouted and cleared, in reality trying to decide what had happened, where it all went south. He'd had a lot of extra time on his hands recently. The change in his habits of socializing had, initially, not gone unnoticed. He'd had offers from the rest of the military contingent; movies, football games, poker, and he'd accepted just enough to keep from being labeled too anti-social, then, over a few days, his "No, thanks" had begun to outweigh his "Sures", and he had started to withdraw. By then, though, nobody really noticed.

It had surprised him how much of his spare time had been spent with his team. He kind of missed working with McKay in the lab - since Chaya, he hadn't dared visit.

He and Ford didn't seem to spend the time they used to talking about football, previous duty stations, women, and the best way to tell if that bug-eyed monster was going to attack. Teyla had found herself suddenly very busy, and their sparring sessions had faltered, then stopped altogether. They stood by him on missions, were their usual trustworthy selves, but the ease they'd once had was gone. He spared a moment of compassion for Derry, a nice enough chap in a situation he had no control of.

And McKay - the man avoided him. In a weird way it was like he'd died after all, and there was a McKay ghost walking the halls, ignoring him when possible, angry and impenetrable when in meetings. There was no quarter given in their arguments any more, and the affection in the insults slung back and forth had entirely vanished.

It was so stupid. He leaned against the wall, letting his head thump gently against it. For McKay, it seemed being grounded was less a loss of freedom than a loss of trust. Sheppard had feared, deep down, that decision would cost him the friendship that had grown almost central to his life here, and it appeared it had. He'd thought it would be worth it if he could know, absolutely, that he'd never feel that tearing loss again, the rootless terror he'd known when he'd seen the body. The image of the physicist's corpse, crushed beneath the rockfall, was with him all the time now, inescapable.

Now, though, hewasbeginning to understandloss could be gradual, a different feeling but the same result. It was nibbling away at him. At them both? He'd heard McKay had turned grim, become a martinet, the only ones who didn't live in fear of the sarcastic wit were Grodin and Zelenka, by virtue of their close association from before, and Kavanagh, who seemed delighted at the shift.

He growled at the turn his thoughts were taking. Maudlin. They'd made their decision, and the bald truth was the city was safer, if only marginally. But it was an enormous cost. The stress was mounting on him. In response to it, he did as he and McKay had been known to do, he'd just done it a man short. He'd ducked the requested meeting this afternoon, avoided the rest of the expedition members, grabbed some water and a couple of energy bars, and headed down below.

Better a live McKay, who hated him and wouldn't discuss anything but business with him, than a dead McKay who couldn't even do that. But then there was a little voice yammering at him, asking if it was McKay he was thinking of, or his own peace of mind. And how much peace of mind did he have when he couldn't even talk to his best friend anymore?

Just sitting, like they used to, watching the comings and goings in the gateroom, or arguing over a chessboard. And the team, the way it had been, watching B-movies with silly aliens and throwing popcorn at the screen…

The door in front of him wouldn't open and he swore, turned away and headed down another hall. Now even the damn city was against him. Everything was falling apart, and though he was tempted to blame the Genii, he knew it was him. His own weakness.

He'd made a promise to himself, when he stood there in front of his superior officeryears ago being busted in rank, that never again would he let himself get in a similar situation. He'd be friendly but not friends, he'd do his job as long as he got to fly. Clouds were good. Sky was good. He'd leapt at McMurdo as a chance to finish his time out ferrying people around, the clean, cold whiteness was a blank sheet where all that had to be written by him was the clouds of snow the rotors kicked up, the runnels the skids left.

Faceless people, in and out. Hey, cold enough for you? Nope, don't see polar bears here. California. Sure didn't think I'd end up here. Not the ass-end of the world, but you can see it from here. Later!

Then O'Neill.

He stopped again, outside another door, tried to will it open. It remained closed. He slammed his hand into it, swore again at the pain.

O'Neill had brought him into some damn secret program. He'd met a whack of fascinating people. He'd done some things he was proud of and some he was ashamed of.

He'd broken his promise to himself.

The next door opened, and he was in a large room, blue green with filtered light from the ocean. The walls were transparent, and he walked over to them, staring out in awe at the changing shades. It was a few moments before he tore his eyes away and looked around.

It was roughly oval, and half of that oval skimmed into the ocean. The other half held a series of panels, and several chairs that faced the clear walls. He scanned the panels. There was some obvious damage, but others seemed intact. He touched one, and it blinked to life. There was some writing, but he ignored it, moving along the line, and by the time he got to the end of it three were active.

"Now what?" he muttered, knowing his first instinct was to call McKay 'Hey - guess what I found!' - in his mind he could see it, the way things used to be, but now…

He made a habit of keeping his military bearing up and running in the world above, but he was alone here. No reason to bother with that.

He dumped his gear, sat down in the chair, leaned back, and watched the ocean.

xxxxx

"…reading like a short." Zelenka trailed behind McKay.

They were down in the bowels of one pier, hot on the trail of a tiny power drain, but when they were facing the Wraith even a small one was worth plugging.

"A short?"

"Sporadic. It is very unusual."

"Well, here we are…" his voice trailed off and he crouched, checking the floor with the flashlight. "Someone's been here recently."

Zelenka frowned. "Problem?"

"Nope." McKay stood. "Army boots. Must be left from scouting," he touched the door and it opened obligingly.

The interior was oval, and the windows to the ocean let in shifting light…

"Oh, crap." McKay tucked his light into his pocket and ran to the occupied chair. "John? John!"

The Major was silent, secured to what looked like a smaller version of a control chair. McKay felt for a pulse, and Zelenka held his breath until the physicist nodded.

"Alive." His voice held relief. "But what's up with this?" He ran his hands over the silvery bands that held him to the chair, then he stopped and squinted at the man's head. "Something's very weird here…"

He started to search the area, touching things seemingly at random. Zelenka followed him. It wasn't often he felt envious of McKay and his adopted gene - well, when the nanovirus attacked, maybe, and he would like to learn to fly that jumper…

"Holy cow."

McKay was leaning over what looked like a monitor. It was on, dimly, and seemed to show a dimensional image of a human skull and brain. Given that there was only one human connected to the machinery, he knew who it was.

"Those probes."

"What?"

Zelenka peered over McKay's shoulder.

"See?" McKay pointed at the image the diagnostic projected. "They're seated in certain very specific areas of his brain. We haven't mapped the human brain, by any means, in fact we know more about our DNA than our brains, but those seem to be set in areas known to be related to memory and creative thought."

He tapped his radio. "Elizabeth, we found Sheppard - and I didn't even know he was lost. He's down here in the third level of the southwest pier, hooked in somehow to a damaged Ancient machine - it was causing our intermittent short. I don't know what this thing does, but it's got about sixty sensors buried in his brain. We'll need - well, everyone, pretty much."

Zelenka heard Weir begin to question, but McKay had tapped off and was back to examining the monitor.

He shuddered. "Having something in your brain...actually penetrating your skull..."

Zelenka nodded understandingly. McKay had been sensitive to the concept since his experience with another version of V.R., a test in behavioural theory that had made use of a V. R. helmet, and probes.

"This must be powered somehow," he commented.

McKay ran his hands over the lit panels. "That's just so wrong," he muttered as he worked, "stuff stuck into your head...Here it is."

It wasn't good news. It never was, not when he had that look on his face. Zelenka knew from McKay's shoulder set, his head tilt, that he was worried. He glanced over at Sheppard, down at the screen again and the concern was written on his face.

He and Peter had discussed it before. Grodin felt that the friendship between the chief science officer and the head of military had seen its last jibe. He'd been remarkably morose about it, and not only because of the negative effect that it had on McKay's personality. He confided he'd seen that relationship as proof the military and the sciences could get along, become more than the sum of their often-prickly parts.

Zelenka hadn't argued the point too vehemently, but within himself he knew the ties that bound McKay and Sheppard were not so easily broken. Bent, fraying, stretched almost to the limits, but not broken.

He had no certainty of this but hope.

They had both been damaged, badly. He'd seen it before, hoped his friends would be spared. Survivours of torture had to deal with the resultant problems, physical and psychological; and friends of survivours had their own challenges to handle. Added to that the fact they'd thought McKay lost - and the incredible impact that had on the Major - and he wasn't altogether surprised at the fights. What alarmed him had been the silences. They were trying to deal separately, and originally, he felt, it had been to spare the other. Now their silence had become a habit, and Zelenka felt responsible in a way the others might not, having lived through something similar in his own family.

He'd suggested, diffidently, to Sheppard one day, that he might want to speak to Heightmeyer, if only to see how McKay was recovering. The scornful bite in the Major's response and the glare accompanying it made him simply nod, and retreat. He'd half-expected an apology - that was generally Sheppard's way - but none was forthcoming and at that point he'd realized that McKay wasn't the only one in trouble. A list mapped itself out in his mind; personality changes, shortness of temper, depression, withdrawing from social activities - it all led to what the Americans had christened Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. He still knew it as shell shock.

It was a special kind of torture to see his friends tearing at each other. He'd told Weir and Heightmeyer of his observations, and a plan had been drawn - an intervention, of sorts - but then Chaya had happened and everything went out the window.

McKay was staring at the scrolling text, reading Ancient almost as fast as he did English. He paused it, checked another monitor, swore.

"Elizabeth, how long till they get here?"

"The team is assembled and on their way," came her voice. "ETA fifteen minutes."

McKay frowned, examined the monitor again. "He may not have fifteen minutes. Radek."

"Hm?"

"It's draining him." McKay stepped over to another panel, confirmed something, and came back.

"See? This shows the chairs, they're tied somehow, with two or more occupants it would just cycle between them, but with only one chair occupied - it's like a power cable in a puddle, every time it tries to shift sources it dumps more energy. And this was designed to be used by the real Ancients..." he trailed off, and Radek could almost see the wheels turning.

He looked at Zelenka, shocked. "It's going to kill him. And soon."

"Safety protocol," he replied immediately. "Redundancy - Ancients love it. Will not let him die."

"This is damaged. We can see it. Who knows if the backups are still functional? If they were, wouldn't they have kicked in by now? Look at that - I'm no doctor, but even I know those readings are bad news. They're getting worse." He ran his hand through his hair, distressed. "And again, designed for full-blood Ancients."

"We cannot remove him, not with how it has merged with him. Would be major surgery, could be damage."

"So we have to get it to release him." He stared at Sheppard. "But we haven't got much time..." He frowned hard, staring at the monitors, then at the screen that showed the probes. Back at the monitors.

Zelenka began to get a bad feeling he knew McKay's thought process. It was confirmed when he beckoned Zelenka over.

"Here's the documentation, accessible with this keypad," McKay told him. "Wiring diagram. This panel won't initialize, get Grodin on that."

"Rodney..."

"Right now it's an open circuit, discharging." He removed his comm and handed it to Zelenka. "It's designed for use by Ancients, and I have the gene. I'm closing it. It'll buy you time to get us out."

He trailed McKay as he headed to the second chair, trying to think of something to say, uncertain if he should say anything. It proved his theory, that the friendship still existed, but this kind of proof he could do without.

McKay paused a moment, looked back at him, and he saw the worry in his eyes.

"Radek..."

"I remember," he said quietly. "Kids, and the Unification theory."

He nodded, and without hesitation, stepped up and sat.

The chair glowed. Zelenka observed carefully as the bands grew across McKay's chest, wrists, lap and ankles. A forest of tiny wires extruded from the headrest, wavered like an anemone in the sea, then clasped around his head and seemed to vanish. He saw McKay's eyes roll back, a shudder went through his body, and his eyes closed.

Anxiously, he checked the monitoring area. The indicators showed more encouraging readings for Sheppard, while McKay's signs had dropped significantly, though not into a danger area yet. Footsteps behind alerted him, and he turned, unsurprised, to see Ford and Teyla. Nodding at them, he touched the comm.

"Dr. Weir, we have a situation."


	3. Part 3

Part 3

The sand had no sharp edges to it. The light had a hardness that didn't seem natural, and the waves crashed on the shore, one after the other, with unnatural regularity.

Sheppard rolled up on one elbow in the sand, scanning the beach as far as he could see, first one way then the other. Nothing moved. No one was there. He leaned back on both hands, staring out at the solid blue ocean, blue as a child's painting.

He couldn't remember getting here, he saw no footprints in the sand, and when he shifted, the surface didn't feel right. It was almost spongy. The whole scene had a slapdash feel to it, as if an indifferent artist were called on to paint a beach at noon.

He felt eyes on him, heard a slight sound. He pushed off, coming to his feet in a defensive crouch, ready for anything…

"McKay."

He straightened, uttered the name in resignation. Of course. If things were going to be weird, naturally McKay would be there.

He stood warily, almost as if he were expecting Sheppard to try to attack him. In contrast to the surroundings, he looked completely real, right down to the bags under his eyes. Bags, the long forgotten voice of his father chimed in, that you could pack army boots in.

"Major." The tone was neutral.

Not seeing a threat, he turned and sat again, back stiff. It was 'go away' in his best Sheppard non-verbal communication. McKay was a genius, he should understand, he thought.

It didn't work this time. McKay wandered over and sat right beside him.

Sheppard ignored him. It was a mistake, he realized a few moments later, because, denied conversation, McKay began to chat with himself.

"So, McKay, where are we? I have no idea, Major. We aren't really here at all, actually," he began. Sheppard pulled his feet under him.

"We're sitting in matching chairs on Atlantis with a really disgusting number of wires burrowing in our brains, as it happens," he continued, as Sheppard stood.

"We found you sitting in one of them about fifteen minutes ago." Sheppard began to walk away, hands in pockets.

"You were ten minutes away from dying, not to put too fine a point on it." McKay was louder now, and he was standing too. "So I hopped in the other one, trying to save your sorry narrow butt, and here I am now stuck in your Playskool dream of California!" He shouted the last words, and Sheppard turned.

"I didn't ask you to save my sorry narrow butt," he replied evenly. "I am going down the beach that way. I would appreciate it if you didn't follow me. I wanted some time on my own, and that's what I'm going to get."

He knew, without looking, that McKay was fuming. He could almost see the expression, the tightening of the thin lips, the jaw clenching. It disturbed him slightly that he knew anyone that well anymore, and he put it from his mind, trudging on.

xxxxx

"Give me some good news." Weir said, and Grodin stepped up to stand beside her. Beckett eyed her, and she sighed. "What?"

"The chairs - the machines - they're still draining them both. There has to have been an independent power source at some point, I don't think even pureblood Ancients could have maintained this function, whatever it is, without it. Thing is, neither are pureblood. John is faring better than Rodney, now."

"Rodney's been in there for a shorter period," Grodin said.

"The therapy gave him the gene, but John is still closer on the evolutionary scale than Rodney. When Rodney plugged himself into the system, it stopped the drain, but no closed system is leakproof, and we know this particular one has been damaged at some point in history. There's something that keeps trying to cycle back to a main bus."

"That was what caused the shorting," Zelenka said.

Beckett looked over to where two of his assistants were setting up IVs for both. "Whatever it is, it's playing havoc with their systems. Electrolyte imbalances, accelerated heart rates, metabolisms' going a mile a minute."

He led them to a powered display. "The belts that are restraining them seem to be efficient bio-monitors, and we can see what's happening here - Rodney got it running before he - well - logged on." It was evident that one set of readings was better than the other. "John has more control of his Ancient side than anyone. Put simply, John can tolerate it better. But it's only for a short time, Doctor. Sooner or later, the leaks in the system will kill them."

Weir stared at the room. It was a mess now, several of the non functioning panels and chairs had been disassembled.

"If we can figure a way to feed additional power to the system, it would buy time to find out how to get them out, correct?"

Beckett nodded.

Weir turned to Grodin. "Find me a jumper cable, and a place to clip it on," she directed.

xxxxx

He kept walking. On the real beach, there would be piers, he thought, and glanced down at the not-sand. When he looked up again, there was a pier.

He walked up underneath it, looking up. It was closer to the real thing, the barnacles on the posts had texture, and the waves had stopped being quite so predictable. He closed his eyes, and imagined a boat, pulled up on the beach. He took some time with it, remembering how old man Sedgewick's ancient lifeguard boat looked, felt, smelled.

He opened his eyes. There it was.

He smiled. This had potential.

"Neat." He turned, annoyed. McKay stood behind him, again, staring at the boat. "Missing something, though."

When Sheppard turned back, the words 'S.S. Minnow' had appeared on the bow.

"Funny." He kept going.

McKay followed.

xxxxx

Ford shifted uneasily, rocking on his heels and forward. It was beginning to irritate Weir.

"Lieutenant?"

He stopped. "Ma'am?"

"What possible reason could the Ancients have had for building something of this sort?" She folded her arms and looked up at the young soldier, who blinked.

"Well, ma'am, first we'd have to know what it is that it's doing to them."

"We know the probes are in certain sections of their brains. I would think that the fact it seems designed for more than one would mean somehow the controls connect them together."

He nodded, understanding she was thinking aloud.

"It might even be sophisticated enough to be considered mechanical telepathy," she continued. "Now, why would you need to be able to know what someone was thinking?"

"Interrogation?"

She nodded. "Possibly. Other ideas?"

"Entertainment? Business transactions of some sort, maybe. So you'd be certain you weren't being cheated."

"Or something else. More benign."

He stared at the chairs. "Psychiatric assessment?"

"And maybe treatment."

He frowned. "Then the wrong people are in those chairs," he said frankly. "If you know what I mean, Doctor…"

She smiled slightly, ruefully. "Oh, yes. I know what you mean." She paused, surveyed the activity. "Would you please find Dr. Heightmeyer and bring her here?"

xxxxx

"So you're gonna follow me to Mexico?"

He stopped and swung around, staring at McKay.

"If there is one here. Since it's a construct, evidently from your mind, I would presume that we might eventually get to Mexico."

He glowered, and an iron cage sprang up around his stalker.

"Oh, please." McKay took a step, and another, and walked through the bars. "If you want me to leave you alone, ask."

"Leave me alone."

"No."

"Please," he exaggerated the word, "leave me alone."

McKay grinned. "Very polite. No."

"What do I have to do to get you to leave me alone?" he almost begged.

"You really want to know?"

Not trusting himself to speak, Sheppard nodded.

"Talk to me."

"What?"

McKay sat down, eyes on the ocean, which was getting more realistic every moment.

"I've talked to everyone I had to, to get back to what I do best. I can quote you all the most recent research into treatment of victims of torture, but they all boil down to 'don't feel guilty' and 'don't let it run your life'."

Sheppard didn't move. He didn't sit, but he didn't walk away, either.

"It's not fun, this psychoanalysis thing. I mean, Kate's a looker, which helps, but it's not something I've ever done easily, talking about myself."

Sheppard snorted. He sat after all.

"You go on about yourself all the time."

"Well, this was different," McKay replied sharply. "It was ok when I had an aim, a reason. I was going to be able to go offworld with you guys again. It made it worthwhile, all that 'talk about your feelings' crap. I was even starting to sleep again. Then you and Elizabeth blindsided me."

"It's only sensible…" Sheppard started, but McKay was faster.

"Sensible, my ass. I've learned something, you know? Psychology is a fuzzy science, but it sometimes gives you insight. Big strong Major Sheppard didn't save the day, went and lost one of his geeks. Oops - not lost - here he is after all. You're like a kid socking a hockey card away in some metal box in your treehouse." He stood abruptly and stared down.

"I'm not a hockey card, Major. Not something you can just tuck away and bring out on special occasions. We'd been through a lot together. Do you know how much it hurt when you threw that away?" He seemed about to say more, but finally turned, heading down the beach.

Sheppard watched him go. It was kind of what he'd been hoping for, the being alone bit, but he hadn't been aware of how deeply McKay had been affected by the decision made to take him off the team.

Or maybe he had been, but just ignored it, putting it down to usual McKay background noise.

"McKay."

He kept walking.

Sighing, Sheppard got up and followed. It hadn't worked for him, why should he let McKay off easy?

xxxxx

"So it isn't exactly the Ancient's version of psychoanalysis." Weir cut through Kavanagh's torrent of words. The man could out-talk Rodney when he wanted to.

Stopped short, Kavanagh shook his head.

"Not exactly, no. But it's not entirely anything else, either. It seems to be designed as - well - a virtual reality system. For training purposes, far as I can tell, but there are notes on using it for entertainment and for helping recovery of those who had suffered breakdowns of some sort."

"Always wondered what the Ancient version of TV was," Beckett muttered.

"That line of reasoning would me lead to believe there was some sort of device designed to observe what happened within the V R," Dr. Heightmeyer suggested. "Has there been anything like that found?"

"It was just an idea, Doctor," Beckett demurred.

"A logical one, Doctor. No matter what this is, there would have had to be facility for someone outside the connection to observe - for safety, if nothing else. I would suggest Teyla and I see what we can find while you work on the nuts and bolts of the problem."

xxxxx

"McKay!"

Shouting wasn't having much of an effect, so Sheppard broke into a trot. The sand yielded under his feet again, less spongy now, more granular. And, of course, harder to run in.

"Damnit, McKay, you want to talk? Let's talk!"

McKay turned at that, stopped, and Sheppard caught up.

"So talk."

"McKay, I didn't want to pull your off-world status," he panted. "Weir and I discussed it at length. She deferred to me, finally, because she saw the logic in it." Panting? He ran farther than that before breakfast every morning.

"You're head of the sciences, of the department that's going to keep us alive and get us back home." He put his hands on his knees, leaned forward, sucking air. Beside him, McKay made an abortive move, as if he wanted to reach out and help him.

"You're the answer man," he said finally, when he caught his breath. "You have to stay somewhere safe, for everyone's sake."

"That is absurd," McKay said dismissively. "Wraith, evil bloodsuckers? I know they know where we are. It's no safer on Atlantis than offworld." He looked at Sheppard, and there was a definite tinge of worry. "Case in point," he noted.

"One of the defunct panels must have been the source of the input, and I bet it provided the access to the main power, too, but it seems that each chair had their own small power source. Kind of a booster to get things started. "

"And that is what John triggered when he sat down," Grodin added. "But when it tried to cycle to the mains, it wasn't there. It just kept trying and trying. If McKay hadn't triggered the other chair when he did…"

"Yes, yes, St. McKay, I know all about that," Kavanagh interrupted. "The point is, Doctor Weir, without the main panel functional there's no central input to - as you put it - attach the jumper cable to."

She let the St. McKay comment slide. "Is there any way to make the panel functional?" she asked patiently.

Kavanagh glanced at Grodin, who stared at the floor. "No," he said, finally. "The damage is far too extensive. We'd need a couple of days to evaluate, never mind starting to fix it."

Weir drew a deep breath. "Carson," she said, and he knew her question.

"We're just doing patchwork here," he replied. "Neither of them will make it to evening."

There was silence.

"Damn it," Kavanagh barked suddenly. "I am an idiot."

"What?" Weir asked.

"Radek! Radek, we have to get into the individual power sources. We have to get into the chairs!"

xxxxx

"Yeah, well, it's the same argument 'you could get hit by a bus crossing the street'," Sheppard said. "It's a bit different from Wraith, and an entire planet that wants to pick your brains for the next ten years."

"We managed, John. We were a team, we worked well together. Our strengths and weaknesses meshed. Like cogs. Why did you throw that down the drain? That's all I ever wanted to know."

A shape appeared up the beach and Sheppard turned his head to look - too fast, his head swam - he must have started to fall because he felt a firm hand grasp his arm, and then the world blurred…

xxxxx

"My name is Elian." The small man bustled around him, for all the world like a tailor taking measurements, only the tapes he used stayed where he put them. Around his wrists, his ankles, his neck, his head…

It was odd. Sheppard knew it was a memory, and he was observing, but somehow he was inside it too, with McKay, feeling his breath grow short at the prospect of what this mad little person was going to do to him.

"We're going to discuss your sad lack of co-operation." He'd finished with the tapes, and attached the leads to each one, and now he stood, bouncing with anticipation. "Actually, there will not be much discussion," he corrected himself. "I won't be talking that much. You'll be screaming too loud to hear me."

He felt McKay's terror. He could actually feel the knot in his gut, and his heart begin to race, but what he heard wasn't actually being said, it was being thought, two words…

"they'll come…they'll come…they'll come…"

…and the electricity began to flow, molten fire streamed through him, and he could feel his muscles cramping…

xxxxx

"They're coding!"

Beckett dove for the crash cart, hearing Sheffield behind him doing the same. They'd planned for this, knowing with the effects of the imbalances accumulating it was just a matter of time. The chest bands would be a problem, but with careful placement they would be able to get the shock to traverse the heart even so.

He pulled the paddles, charged, and…

"Hold it!" Zelenka shouted. "Do not…" his English failed, but he waved his hands, and Beckett looked at the monitors.

"They're back," he said. "Somehow, it was the chairs."

"If they are diagnostics, it is reasonable they are support as well, no?"

"You're right, Radek," Beckett said, returning the paddles to their place. "But that would have taken power, too."

Weir stood between the chairs, staring down at Kavanagh, deep in the bowels of Sheppard's chair. "Any luck, Doctor?"

"Some. I've identified the right conduits," he replied. "Actually, that little crisis was very helpful. I could actually see the power re-route itself."

Weir sighed, exchanged glances with Beckett, and returned to the main monitor.

"That took much power," Zelenka said quietly. "There was not much to give." He looked up, worry in his eyes. "Their time is shorter."

"And even if we do get the chairs powered, their bodies will give out anyway."

"There must be some way to trick the machine." The Czech was thinking aloud. "Fool it into thinking the session is complete. The main processor would do it normally. Without it we must try something else…" He looked up at Weir, as Teyla's voice came from behind the main bank.

"We have found something!"

xxxxx

The monitor was a simple headset. It resided in a small alcove that reminded Weir of the pod-like phone booths of the eighties. The observer sat in a small easychair, nothing so grand as the actual interface chairs, and slipped the headset on.

Heightmeyer had waited only as long as needed for the set to be checked out - no probes, nothing that would connect her directly with the system, though Weir had the feeling it wouldn't have made a difference anyway - and then she'd sat down and slipped the set on.

"Radek is right," she said distantly. "…next step in virtual reality…I think I'm in a memory…" she stopped talking a moment. "Little man." She raised her hands to the set. "I think I know…no!"

She ripped the set off, gasping, eyes tearing, holding it in one hand.

"What was it?"

"Memory of the torture," she replied shortly. "I was within the memory itself." She glanced up at Weir. "I swear that John was there too. I could feel him."

She eyed the set like it was a snake, then prepared to put it on again.

"Wait..." Weir started, reaching out to grasp the headset.

"Elizabeth. This is a psychoanalysts dream. Words are our enemy, they can conceal, but this is actual memory, feelings. I have to try. When they get out of the chairs, they'll need me." Conviction rang in her words, determination was in her eyes, and Weir released her grip. Carefully, Kate replaced the headset.

xxxxx

Blackness. Finally. The torture had ended, but by then the line between his mind and McKay's memory was harder to comprehend. He felt himself rolled, gently, but he was in the hands of the enemy and had to resist…

…then the quiet voice. "Hey. Answer man." Familiar voice?

Disbelief. It couldn't be. It was a trick, they were playing a trick.

"Won't tell," and he felt the rawness of McKay's throat as if it were his own. "They'll come. Won't tell you anything."

Fatigue and pain welled, blocking hearing, sight, only a stubborn denial, "won't tell…" absolute conviction, and then…

…then someone lifted him, someone touched him and didn't hurt him. Held him close. Warm. Someone else, too, and he could tell from the scent it was Teyla, and warm hands holding his…

And he recognized his own voice, heard through McKay's ears - how weird was that - it broke through the pain and denial. "We've been looking for you."

They'd known. The rush of relief brought tears to his eyes. No energy, truly none left, but had to let them know he'd heard.

"…you knew…"

And then it got weirder...

There were snippets of memory, bits of flashes that brought waves of emotion, and he was deeper in the recollections, hardly aware of his own identity anymore, seeing it through McKay's eyes, feeling his emotions. Seeing a bowed head through the bedrail, realizing it was Sheppard sitting by his bedside, feeling a flood of gratitude towards some greater power, and affection for the man beside him that eclipsed the hours of pain - at least for a while. The laughter of that poker game in the infirmary that had gone on far beyond visiting hours. Sheer joy at walking the halls tempered by a faint regret that Sheppard was so busy he couldn't join him.

Then it took a turn. Realizing he was being avoided for some reason, finally, when excuses were not enough anymore, and it painted a fine layer of sourceless guilt over everything. Throwing himself into work and pulling back from the others. Working as hard as he could so he'd fall asleep right away, so dreams wouldn't come, then suffering the dreams of pain and rage and loss that came anyway. Standing, shaking, outside Sheppard's door on more than one occasion, hand raised, never knocking.

Chaya was just wrong, somehow, and his suspicions turned to concern for Sheppard, but the Major didn't care. Bad situation if he's under control by her. Crap, worse situation if he isn't…

Grounded.

Everything fell into a black hole with that simple word.

Work until exhausted then pass out, food only fuel to work again. Responsibility kept him going, kept him from the cowards way out he craved in the darkest moments of deepest night. He was stronger than that, he told himself. He'd never needed anyone before, and he didn't need anyone now.

Not speaking with Kate anymore, she'd think him weak. Not talking to anyone from what he now thought of as his old life. Not touching memory any more, it was unpredictable, it might turn up remembrance of a time he couldn't afford to think of. When he'd been on a team. When he'd known real friendship, even brotherhood. When he'd been happy.


	4. Part 4

Part 4

His hands hurt. McKay felt it through Sheppard's memory as he wiped sweat from his forehead with the back of his wrist and kept digging. Beside him, others pulled rock away, spaded out pockets of broken blocks and gravel. Someone gave him a pair of gloves, he didn't know who - he pulled them on and kept going.

The rescue team arrived from Atlantis, and he was gently shuffled aside as the heavier equipment was brought in to move the largest blocks that had fallen. They were well trained, and there was little conversation as they managed to clear the worst of the rock away, moving deeper and deeper into the underground room.

He'd caught his breath and was accepting a drink from someone's canteen when the activity stopped, and a grim faced Marine made his way back the ten meters or so they'd dug, stopping a few feet from him.

He could still feel the dead coldness of certainty. He'd waited half a second, just to have that time more that he wouldn't need to face the reality, then he stood, handed off the canteen. Followed the Marine to where the team waited. Half buried in smaller rubble he saw the edge of the uniform, the heel of a boot.

Like an automaton, he'd moved towards the pile, begun clearing it carefully. The team helped. He felt a presence beside him and looked - Teyla was digging steadily, tears rolling down her face. There was one very large rock. Maybe it was resting on another, maybe there was a gap…and then they got to the blood, and it wasn't resting on another rock. There wasn't a gap.

McKay found it odd to see what had been, at that moment, to Sheppard, his own dead body. He felt Sheppard swallow hard on the bile, and felt the battle between training and emotion won by training. He helped with the removal of the final rock, held Teyla for a moment when they saw what was left of their friend.

xxxxx

"Ready for the cable." Kavanagh reached out, and Grodin passed it on. Zelenka babysat a naquadah generator with Ford standing behind him, watching the scientist play the controls like a piano. "Connected. Go."

The power grew, gradually, and Beckett was at the monitors, watching. "Little more," he said. "Little more…hold it!"

Weir hovered, waiting. "That'll do for a bit. It's supporting the interfaces now, stopping the leaks." He sighed, turned his attention to his friends. "Means it'll be the metabolic imbalances that do it for them."

"Time, Doctor. It bought us a bit more time." She looked over to the brain trust. "Any luck with the other access?"

"Not yet, Doctor, but we're still working on it."

xxxxx

He opened his eyes, shuddering, lying on his back on the sand, McKay next to him on his side. Evidently the physicist had tried to keep him from falling, and then the memories had caught them both, dragging them down.

He had a feeling whatever was happening was still unfinished, and looked beyond McKay's body. The shape was still there.

He looked back at McKay. Blue eyes met brown warily.

"Did you just…" Sheppard started.

"Yeah. You too?"

"Me too."

McKay rolled on his back too, breaking the gaze. "Explains some stuff."

"Yeah."

"Someone's watching," the physicist said a second later.

"I saw, just before...whatever that was."

"Not surprising. I'd think there'd be some kind of way to see what was happening. Probably Kate. Maybe Elizabeth."

"She's welcome to watch. Not much to see."

There was a pause.

"So," McKay said.

"So." It was a bit uncomfortable, Sheppard found, realizing what their friendship meant to the temperamental physicist. And even more so realizing it meant at least as much to him.

"Guess we talked, huh?" McKay didn't look at him.

"Could call it that. Better than a heart to heart."

"I guess you saw me at my worst," McKay said. "Now you know for certain how weak I am. It's just as well I don't go offworld."

Sheppard blinked in disbelief. "You thought I took you off the team because you were weak? Are you nuts?"

"The whole indispensable thing was just to feed my ego. It might have worked, too, if you guys hadn't pretty much shunned me once the decision was made." His voice was quiet, miserable. "Just a few chats with the old gang, might have made it easier for my transition back tolab geek."

"I never thought you were weak." Sheppard stumbled over the words. "Not in my wildest nightmares. And now, seeing what…" he stopped, swallowed. "Weak? You're stronger than I ever imagined."

"Well then, why did you do it?" He was really mad, now, and Sheppard stared. "What was it Heightmeyer said to you, way back when, she said she'd told you the faster I could get back with the team the better. She wasn't just talking, you know."

That did it. He reached over and grabbed McKay by one wrist, hoping it was the contact that triggered it…

…the rest of it was a blur. He knew he'd called in, organized the recovery effort. He'd done everything right, the report was made. The rain had helped him forget he was crying, but then it had stopped, a brisk wind had picked up and he'd gone back inside his room.

He shucked his clothes, feeling in memory the wet fabric stick to him. McKay's presence still clung, when it had happened for real it had been just wishful thinking…

He pulled on his sweats, his t-shirt, and lay down on his bed, arm over his eyes. That didn't work. He kept seeing the excavation, what was left of the body. He felt the odd lightness of the bag as they carried it back. It cycled in his mind, over and over, and he sat, finally, and stood, and slammed out of his room, running from the memory.

It didn't help. Out of breath, panting, finally, he stopped, outside the door he dreaded opening. But someone would have to do it, it should be him, he supposed. He was the team commander. It was suitable he be the one to clear his best friend's quarters.

'best friend…'

He thought the door open, stepped in, stopped inside. It was a mistake, he knew, as his throat closed against the sob. Not now. Maybe not ever could he do this, but it was still better than his own quarters. He could feel McKay's presence here. There was another jacket tossed over a chair, it was a uniform jacket, just like the one he'd been wearing…

He closed his eyes, pinched the bridge of his nose, trying to control himself. And then he found himself with the jacket in hand, sitting in the corner next to the chair, hiding from the pain, hiding from the rest of his friends while he wept over the loss of the one that had filled the brother-shaped hole in his life.

xxxxx

"I don't know how much more of this they can take," Beckett said bleakly. It had been another crisis, and again the chairs had performed their functions, but the bodies they maintained continued to weaken.

Grodin jumped back as something hissed and spat. "Damn!"

"What?" Zelenka asked.

"We can't get into the transfer bus," the Englishman replied. "Nothing we do will make the interface take."

Kavanagh sighed. "That's it, then. They're beyond our help."

It was a measure of their fatigue that the coldness of the comment passed with only a few glares.

"Radek?" Weir asked quietly.

"He is correct." Zelenka replied. "We have exhausted the possibilities from out here. We must hope that they are able to complete whatever task it is they have set themselves." He stared at the chairs and their occupants. "We must hope they find oak."

She glanced at him, and he shrugged. "Anger is pine. Burns quickly. Hope is oak." He smiled. "Rodney said that."

xxxxx

Teyla watched the woman carefully. This person knew so many secrets. She was the repository of fears, hopes, dreams for so many people, yet she carried the burden lightly.

Before this, she'd had no contact with the small core of psychologists the others had brought, in fact the concept had been completely foreign to her. Now, though, understanding the complexity of the lives the Earthers had left, and the complexity of the lives led here, she could begin to understand the need, though she couldn't see any reason any Athosian would need to avail themselves of their services. Even her name was edged, hard to remember. But she was here, now, wanting to help her teammates, and for that she was grateful

Who did Heightmeyer confide in, she found herself wondering. Upon whose' shoulders did she lean?

She stepped forward, concerned, as the woman began to weep - it was silent, still, tears simply tracing their patient path down her face. Teyla knew better than to remove the headset, and simply reached out, holding her nearest hand in both of her own.

xxxxx

_Excerpt from the letters of Dr. K. Heightmeyer_

_I can't describe it properly. I was there, with them, through the two worst moments in their lives, and the connection they had with each other was the core of what got them through. I've seen things that I never should have, but I'm not sorry for it either. It's what makes it worth it, glimpses of nobility and the fact that we have an almost limitless capacity to care for each other._

_I always thought they were decent people, but now I admire them without reservation. _

xxxxx

"Too many deaths." Sheppard was vaguely aware it was his voice, but it seemed to be functioning without his conscious intervention. "I can't let it happen again. No more."

"John." Someone was crouched above him. "John, wake up. It's over. I'm still here."

He opened his eyes, looked up at McKay, reaching for him, pulling back, fearful of starting the memory cycles again. Sheppard felt, though, that particular part of this whole thing was over, and he reached up and grasped McKay's hand. McKay winced, eyes shut, but when nothing happened he opened his eyes again.

"Weird," he said, and helped Sheppard sit.

"I'm so damn tired."

"Me too." McKay sat next to him again. There was a short pause.

"I'm sorry."

"I didn't know."

Their words collided, and they grinned at each other.

"Best friend, huh?"

"I was wrong, wasn't I?"

It happened again, and this time they chuckled.

"You first."

McKay nodded. "So it wasn't because you thought I was weak. It was because you're selfish."

"Am not!" It was a kneejerk reaction, but then he paused a second. "Maybe I am. I couldn't help the deaths of my friends in Afghanistan. I thought I could keep you safe."

"Major, 'safe' and 'wraith' are mutually exclusive."

Sheppard dropped his head. "I don't want to lose any more friends," he admitted softly.

McKay toyed with the sand, picking up a handful and letting it trickle down. It was a real beach, now, and the grains had the warmth of the sun in them.

"You'd manage," he said softly. "You're strong. You'd survive."

"I don't want to have to." Sheppard reached over and caught some of the sand as it left McKay's fingers.

"I don't blame you. How could one live without my wit and good judgment?" He sighed. "But don't shut me out, John. You can't protect me by pushing me away."

"I have been trying that, haven't I?"

"And who do you think tracked the short down here - wherever we really are - and found you? You can't get rid of me that easily."

"So it would appear." He grinned at McKay, but it faded when it wasn't returned.

"What?"

"You were dying, that's why I hooked myself up. That probably means I'm dying too."

Sheppard glared. "You did what? You're deliberately trying to piss me off, aren't you?"

"Absolutely," McKay snapped. "I've got wires in my head just to annoy you – and you know how I feel about wires in my head. Zelenka was with me, and we'd called down backup, so I guess it's out of our hands now. Why you go off randomly sitting in things, what with that gene of yours and everything in the city falling over itself to be touched by you…"

"You know what?" Sheppard said, interrupting the rant. "I tried to open two other doors before I got to this one. They wouldn't open for me."

"Everything opens for you." McKay objected.

"Not this time. I think the city was steering me here. It wanted me to sit in the chair. Which means it won't let us die." Pleased with the logic, he grinned again at McKay, who sighed and managed a half-hearted one in return. "Trust me," he added.

"Do you trust me?" McKay tossed back.

"Absolutely." He held up a hand, forestalling the next sentence. "In fact, I'll talk to Elizabeth as soon as we're out of here. I'd like you back on the team." He raised a brow. "If you're interested."

"Oh, I think I can tear myself away from my fascinating study of how the Ancients' laundry worked."

Sheppard shoved him gently on the nearest shoulder, and McKay chuckled, caught his balance, shoved back. It had almost degenerated to a full-scale wrestling match when the beach, ocean and sky dissolved, and they were falling into blackness.

xxxxx

"They're done."

Teyla glanced up, heart in her eyes. The woman smiled at her and squeezed her hand briefly.

"They did it. The system will be releasing them soon."

She removed the headset and stood, wavered a bit. Teyla stepped to her side and she steadied herself, then thanked her in the Athosian manner, and from her it was an effortless thing, without the awkwardness most other Earthers displayed.

"We should tell Dr. Weir."

xxxxx

Weir hadn't really noticed the almost subliminal hum until it wasn't there. A few seconds after Kate appeared, the bands holding Sheppard and McKay into the chairs folded back into themselves, and the probes withdrew smoothly, leaving no marks at all.

Beckett was between the chairs an instant later, directing the gurneys, and everyone stood well out of the way. Weir looked around the faces as they waited, seeing concern on most. Detached interest on Kavanaugh's.

"What happened?" she asked, but Kate just shook her head.

"Six months of intensive psychotherapy," she replied. "It was astonishing. To put it simply, the machine gave them a chance to walk in the other's shoes. I'll want a couple of sessions with them, but the hard work's done..." she trailed off at the sound of a heart monitor squealing a warning, as the medical team reached the door.

"Arrhythmia," they heard Dr. Bibby report. "He's going down again..."

"Come on, Rodney, old son, don't you be doin' that..." Beckett's voice carried back through the door before it closed, and Teyla frowned.

"I believe there is still hard work to do," she said quietly.

xxxxx

Somehow, it was completely natural to wake up in the infirmary. He was wired up like a Christmas tree, he felt as weak as a kitten, and - he shifted - there were tubes where man was never meant to have tubes, but he was fully awake and aware.

He rolled his head over to one side and saw, without surprise, that McKay was also the recipient of the wire and tube package; at least, he presumed the tubes were there too; and between them Beckett dozed in a chair that actually looked fairly comfortable.

Must have been hiding that one, he mused. "Hey."

Becket woke instantly. "Major."

His voice was hoarse, but quite functional. "How's McKay?"

Beckett glanced over. "He'll be fine. He was in worse shape, though, so don't expect company for a bit." He eyed his patient. "That is, presuming you want company."

Sheppard nodded, aiming a warm grin in the sleeping physicist's direction.

"We - worked some stuff out. Good timing, though, getting us out when you did."

Beckett shook his head. "You did it, the two of you, somehow. We'd run out of options and you were both dying. You've been here pushing three days, incidentally." He adjusted the IV. "You were out of the woods after a day, but we weren't certain about Rodney until last night. You were talking to him, Major. Don't you remember?"

He thought, and some small glimpses seemed to come through. A one sided conversation that seemed to go for hours. "Kind of. I don't know if I was really awake."

"You promised he'd be able to join the team again. You sounded very sincere." Sharpness crept into his voice. "Were you?"

"Absolutely. Carson, I meant it." He sighed. "We have some stuff to get through, both of us, but I won't shut him out again."

"Good." He straightened the top cover. "Sleep for now. Dr. Weir will be here when you wake up again. You can tell her then."

Sheppard watched the broad back retreat through the screens, and turned his head to look again at McKay, startled when he saw the physicist was awake, watching him.

"Hey," he said gently.

"Hey yourself."

"Carson says you're gonna be fine." And now, surprisingly, he felt a bit awkward. They'd shared more than a couple of beers and a late night yak, after all. Some seriously personal demons had been wrestled.

"Up and around in no time," he continued. "That's good, you know, 'cause I think you put on a couple pounds while you were back in the lab…" he trailed off under the steady gaze.

"You weren't just saying it, last night…about going offworld again...were you?" McKay's voice was quiet, hesitant, as if he weren't quite certain he'd really heard right, or if it had been wishful thinking.

Suddenly, he wasn't embarrassed any more. Something inside, something that had been rattling around like a loose cog, finally fell into place again. This was Rodney McKay, genius, pain in the ass, best friend, quite literally soul brother, and they had nothing much left to hide from each other at all.

"No, Rodney, I wasn't." He rolled over, groaned a bit, but waved off the look that suddenly turned concerned. "Just stiff. I bet you'll be too."

McKay still looked unconvinced, so he made it a bit more formal.

"I would like you to rejoin my team. Would you?"

McKay smiled. "Of course." He paused. "I suppose Elizabeth's going to be mad..." he mused. "And what about Stu?"

"I'll find him another team, if he wants."

"And Elizabeth?"

Sheppard grinned back. "My team, my call," he said happily.

xxxxx

_Excerpt from the letters of Dr. K. Heightmeyer_

_So much of what we do is related to fear, Tony. We try to teach people to overcome it, or if that's not possible - and often it isn't - we help them manage it. And that's what takes the time. That's where words are a blessing and a curse - we need them to communicate, but they're so imprecise._

_This - thing - it cut through all that. In the space of about two hours they did the hard part for themselves, they managed instinctively what I'd thought would take months to accomplish._

_I had one session with them each separately, and one with them together, and it's like...well, not like it never happened, they both still have nightmares and likely will for a long time, but they've put a major fear behind them. They know exactly where they stand with each other, and what they mean to each other. That is a rare thing, and I think they know it._

_The team is back together, and things are as normal as they can be here. Remind me to tell you about what happened to the first expedition here, and how the time ship took Weir back ten thousand years...or maybe not, I still only half-believe it, and I was here. _

_I still don't know why I write these, I know they'd never pass the censor, and I know you'll never read them. I guess it's a holdover from our college days. _

_I miss you, darling. I'm sorry I'm not there. I know your sister will keep the wreath fresh. Know that I love you, and I know you're with me always. _


End file.
